The Benefits of Slowing Down

I’VE FOUND I’ve often times had occasion to be rushed and that this rushing has resulted in a lack of peace or shalom. It’s modern-day busyness.

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The key issue I think is we have the tendency to enjoy doing things for achievement -- so much so that much of the time we try to achieve many (or too many) things simultaneously. And, the result is we run on adrenalin; continual use of these stores then creates lower natural need from the body to create serotonin -- a critical chemical for keeping the mind/body healthy. (A function of psychosomatic health.) It is no coincidence that people who run on adrenalin are often also stimulant junkies (including coffee, cigarettes etc) during the day and then tend to use/abuse alcohol[1] to allow the body to relax at night. It’s a chemical cocktail replacing what the body does naturally.

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I have found it personally very helpful not to take in the CATS[2]; these are caffeine, alcohol, tobacco, and sugar. Research has found that people having more than three (3) standard coffees/drinks a day, smoking, and refined sugar in the diet are very destructive for health over the longer term.

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The key issue for driven, “A” type personality people is the need to relax every now and then, to learn to slow down and lay back a little in life. It is a core health risk for “A” types -- a combination of poor dietary and exercise practices, plus abuse of the CATS that sees health for these types spiral south in the “Dangerous Decade,” that is 44-54 years of age.

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So, what if you’re sleeping eight hours a night, exercising and eating healthily, but still suffer from the inability to slow down? There’s always more you can do.

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I know for me it is as simple as being contented with the meagre things in one’s existence. Having things to look forward to. I find it helpful to do the things that seem to matter most -- a search for one’s own personal truth; that is, what is truth to me. The important should ‘get done.’ The unimportant should only be done if there’s time; time to relax and reflect is critically important. I find this time not only helps me calm my heart physically, but it restores my creative balance, and when creativity returns, my mind has recuperated sufficiently and is ready for another onslaught… I’m calling these breaks, “creativity recovery breaks.”

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Ti estin alethia. “What is truth?” asked Pilate of Jesus, in John 18:38. Jesus came to ‘testify to the truth’ -- but I ask also, “What is truth?” It is about discerning for me, for you, as individuals, what is the right, just, and fair thing to do; what is the best, most appropriate thing to do in, or at that given moment, and to be supremely happy knowing it is ‘truthfully’ good to do.

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It is my belief that if I am discerning truth correctly, I will be supremely happy if I am acting on my perception of the truth, no matter if it is painful or joyful. When I diet to lose weight, and I rise up above the fear thoughts of missing tasty food, rising up to a level of truthfully seeing my transformed body, in its glorious, fit state, I keep going one day at a time toward my goal. We have to discern, and then obey the truth. We must be ruthless about it. There's no other way.

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There remains two very important questions: Am I doing what is important? -AND- What is truthfully important for "ME" to do?

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Copyright © 2008, Steven John Wickham. All Rights Reserved Worldwide.

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[1] Alcohol is a known Central Nervous System (CNS) depressant, and taken in more than 2-3 standard drinks has that effect.
[2] Acknowledgement to Dr. John Tickell’s A Passion for Living.